Taking Wing
by shadoedseptmbr
Summary: Flipping Coins 'verse. The Last Straw via Fenris and Hawke. Or, choosing to face the tiger.
1. Chapter 1

_Author's Note. Flipping Coins 'Verse. This takes place directly after the meeting with Alistair in Going Home. _

**Taking Wing**

Fenris waited until they were in the shadow of the estate to speak.

"What was that?"

Aedan glanced back at Fenris. He'd been quiet since they left the keep after meeting King Alistair. She'd felt his brooding concern, heavy on her shoulders and hoped it would dissipate as he prowled at her heels. "What?" She knew, of course.

"If you survive it?" Fenris' olive skin was ashen as he quoted her words back.

She sighed. "Fenris, it's nothing. I was just overwhelmed by...nostalgia and...he seemed decent, solid, don't you think? Good looking armor."

"Hawke?" Grasping her shoulders in an almost harsh grip, he turned her towards him.

There was worry in his roughened voice, just a tinge of fear. She sighed and ran her fingers through his hair, smiling into his eyes." How much longer do you think Kirkwall will stand like this? Do you think the knife edge is going to hold much longer?"

"I...can't imagine it will be much longer."

"No. And who have they called their Champion? Where else will I be but in the middle? Templars, mages, coterie, demons. Oh, my. Someone could get a good hit. I'm pretty lucky to have made it this far." His fingers tightened on her shoulders. "Well, luck and you by my side."

"You will always have me by your side." She was right. There would be a conflict soon and he knew his place.

"I don't doubt it." She didn't. But luck? Luck would run out on them, someday. And deep down, she'd never expected to reach thirty. But...why dwell on it? She drew one finger up his ear and smiled as he shivered.

Fenris slid his hands down, just brushing his fingers along the full curve of her breasts to sit at her waist, curling into the edges of her jerkin, feeling the need to hold onto her, anchor her, his Hawke, as though she might fly away from him. Disappear into her shadows.

"We could go, now. You told me once that you wanted to go back. That Ferelden was still your home."

"I did." She recalled that talk, so early in their days together. "It was a long time ago, I'm surprised you remember."

"I remember nearly every word you've ever spoken to me." He tugged her into the alcoved entry of her estate, shaded and green under vines and cupped her jaw in his hand, tilting her head to kiss her. She wrapped her arms around him, eagerly, her tongue darting out to sweep along his lower lip and then gliding in to twine with his.

He wasn't about to be distracted though, not even...gah, she was too clever by half. His eyes closed as she stroked deft fingers along the open spaces along his spine. "Hawke, let's go inside."

"Your wish, Fenris, is my command." She cut him sly eyes as she disengaged from him and grabbed the door's levered handle.

If only that were so. He would have her on Isabela's boat and bound for Ferelden in hours. Back to that home she had begged the warden king for. It had set every nerve he had on edge, the longing in her voice. The underlying fear that she would never see it again. He stalked into the estate at her heels, eyes lighting briefly on the courtyard wall he'd pressed her against that long ago summer night. Again he looked at her and felt the urge to bind her, hold her close and safe. But she would never allow it.

Hawke waved Bodahn off when he came to collect their gear after they stripped their outer armor and washed their faces. All it needed was a quick brush down and putting away, which they did, Aeryn stepping out of her boots to pad on the cool stone floor in bare feet. Chatting with a king didn't work up much of a lather.

There were trunks in the hall that hadn't been there before. The dwarves were packing up their last few years in Kirkwall and heading for Orlais, away from the storm Aedan Hawke expected to blow in any moment.

Up the stairs and into her quiet, shaded, cool room, unchanged in all this time, except now his trunk stood in one corner, his clothes were folded into the wardrobe. He still spent time at the mansion, mostly padding through the dank rooms to raid the cellars. She had clothes and such there, but almost always they returned to the solid, well-kept warmth of the Amell estate.

He slipped his hands under the linen tunic to cup her breasts in his warm, hard palms and she leaned back against his lean, bare chest into his embrace with a soft sigh. Tracing the long line of her throat, first with tongue, then back with teeth, he felt her pulse speed and her breathing grow ragged. What would she allow, then?

She twisted in his arms and he admired again the graceful, lithe strength that infused her as he tugged the tunic up and over her head and pressed her backwards, until her knees hit the bedframe. She cocked her eyebrow at him. "Pushy."

"You enjoy it." His voice sunk deep in his chest in a growl as he captured her wrists in his hands. And she grinned, just a little sharply.

"Yes, I do." Those wide grey eyes like beaten silver dwelled on his mouth and she darted forward to kiss him but he held her still, with slight pressure on the delicate wristbones. He saw her eyes widen. Generally, their bedsport was a give and take romp. Only rarely did one of them take control and here was the sign that that was what Fenris wanted. She hesitated then and he stepped closer, a predatory smile twisting his lips.

"Sit on the bed." It was very much an order and she lifted her chin, just a slight bit imperiously, but then shrugged her white shoulders and did as he requested. Knees together, back straight, hands in her lap as though she was in a parlor taking tea. He tugged at her breast band. "Off." Looking up at him from beneath dark lashes, she complied, tossing the garment to the side. With one finger, he traced the soft full curve of one breast, then the other, circling the peak, watching the aureole contract and her rosy nipples pebble. He flicked his eyes up, but hers were on his hands, now cupping and kneading, her plump lower lip caught between white teeth.

Crouching, he set his mouth to a tender, turgid nipple and suckled as she gasped and arched her back. He rolled it gently between teeth and tongue and mirrored the movement with warm calloused fingers on the other. He switched after a minute, laving the left side now, lavishing it with attention as she pressed against him, her breath catching in her throat. For a moment he pulled away, observing the blush spread across her pale skin in the filtered light of the afternoon. Aedan brought her hands up to his neck, to skim up to his ears, but he jerked back.

"Hands to yourself, Hawke." He warned.

She pouted. "I want to..."

"Not now. Allow me my..." He paused. "My pursuit."

"What is it that you're pursuing, since I promise I'm not running?"

He merely smiled, a hint of wickedness in the tip of his lips, but heat shimmered in the depths of his eyes. She made a little show of setting her hands to her sides.

He nodded his thanks and then dropped his head to run kisses down the valley between and slipped to his knees, his hands straying to the laces of her trousers. In a nimble flick of fingers they were loosened. Reaching around, he gripped the back of her waistband, pulled and when she lifted, stripped her, smalls and all, tumbling her back to lean on her elbows, laughing.

Setting one hand on her taut stomach, Fenris let his long, blunt fingers of his other hand drift between her thighs, sliding into her slick, stroking and circling, circling, circling her clit. She gasped and her hips twitched up, following his movement. He played, slower and more intense contact and then fleeting, little deft movements that ratcheted her up, drove her to beg.

"Maker, Fenris. Come...come on and..." She coaxed.

"Not yet." He purred and his clever fingers pressed into her sheath as he watched her writhe. Two and then he pulled away and he smiled at her little whine. He slid three back in, stretching her wet clinging heat and searching for...

"Ah, oh...please, Fenris again, please, _please_..." Hawke locked her knees against the bedframe she was still draped against and drove down against his hand.

Instead, he leaned and breathed in the scent of her arousal, hints of the sea and of apples. He spread her wider, with his shoulders and nosed between her folds to lick, delicately, tasting.

She hummed, a warm, delighted sound as he explored her with his tongue, flicking against the nubbin, sending shocks of pleasure coursing up her nerves. But she was soon begging, "Let me, oh, let me come, please, Maker…"

"You are too impatient." He tried to sound annoyed, but he gave in then, to her pleading, to the want in her husky voice and stroked the spongy inner spot once and twice and "Oh, Maker, Fenris...ahh..." He felt her pulse around his fingers, soaking his hand, chin with the wet evidence of her orgasm. He pulled away as she trembled.

Before she could recover, even open her eyes, he'd levered himself over her, licking a stripe up her flat belly, between her breasts, tasting salt and the indefinable autumnal taste of her, settling his lean hips between her strong pale thighs.

Aedan brought her hands up to hold him to her, but he reared back and caught them again, pinning them to either side of her shoulders, bracing himself there. "No."

Fenris shifted and then in a smooth, clean thrust hilted his cock in her as she shuddered under him. He allowed himself only rolling shallow movements until she was undulating, responding to him with the whole of her lithe body. He growled, dipping down to catch her bruised lower lip between his teeth, to nudge her mouth open, licking, sharing the flavor of her desire. Her tongue curled with his, entwined, enticed.

Denied her hands, she locked her legs around his hips and worked against him, entreating him to come deeper. He kept his movements small and teasing for long minutes until she was desperate, whining and thrashing her head and he had hardly a shred of control left.

Gutterally, he spoke. "Hawke...Aedan...look at me. Open your eyes, _dulceda, alatus_." She did, obeying the request with gleaming eyes, black with just a bright ring of pale silver. Her gaze, locked with his as they strove, his hands clutching her wrists.

Then, oh then he drew back and thrust, deep. Her pelvis smashed up against his as she bucked to meet him. Again and her thighs clamped around his hips so hard he would expect bruises tomorrow. Again and her tight, hot sheath tightened like a velvet vice around his cock as her climax caught her. Her eyes fluttered, closed and he begged now, "No...stay with me."

With what seemed like an act of pure defiant will, she did, gasping "Fenris, oh, so..." And he spent, coming with a white hot blaze through his veins. He collapsed across her, her wrists still captured.

They shifted, burrowing under the light sheet as the sweat gleaming on their skin cooled even in the warm air.

He believed her to be asleep. He was nearly so, when she whispered to him, in the cloaking dark. "I remember too. I remember you telling me sometimes you have to turn and face the tiger. I'm not running this time, Fenris."

She slept and dreamt of shadows, comforting and dark.

But he lay awake, wishing he had never told her of tigers.

**_AN:_**

_So, I imagine Fenris might use a term or two of Arcanum for lover's talk as well as swearing. This is an approximation of Latin._

_dulceda_ sweetness

_alatus _winged


	2. Chapter 2

It was less than a month later.

The morning had dawned hazy and hot, autumn came to Kirkwall in a heatwave. Fenris had followed Hawke, collecting Varric and Aveline and had gone to the Gallows at Orsino's request only to turn back to Hightown. Sebastian joined them as they passed the Chantry, the little witch trotted up just as they strode up the steps to the Keep.

And then the abomination and his destruction. And Fenris had no qualm spitting the epithet now. Not when he'd seen Hawke's sweet face go grey as crimson light spilled and shattered over Kirkwall. Not with Sebastian Vael's horrified cries echoing, with him in mourning on his knees behind them. Hawke was in sudden motion, spinning the mage around reaching to cuff him across the face with the back of her gloved hand. "Why?! Why in the name of...of _anything_ would you do this?" And then she whispered. "Why would you make me complicit?" And Fenris recalled the errand she ran the day before, coming back with a worried expression and refusing to talk about it.

Sebastian's sharp ears picked that up, even through his prayers and he turned on his heel towards her, fury on his aristocratic features. Fenris stepped up, trying to subtly stand between the maddened archer and Hawke. "You knew? You knew about this, Hawke?"

"Not now, Sebastian, please." She turned back to Anders, when he began justifying his actions, shaking her head. "Nothing. Nothing is worth this, you i_idiot_./i Sodding Void, you've just made it _worse_!"

Meredith was screaming vengeance down on the heads of all mages. Orsino was trying to explain that his people had nothing to do with it. And then they were both looking at Hawke. Waiting for her decision. He'd never seen her look so blank. Drawing all her emotion down for just a minute until...he felt it like a blow to his solar plexus... she looked up at him with such utter despair in her eyes. What? What was she thinking?

"I side with the mages. This is not their fault. And Bethany is up there." She turned away from him and he was frozen. Why was she so suddenly.._.Festis Bei_.

She thought he would turn away from her. She thought that if she tried to save her sister, he would turn to Meredith. That after everything, after her years of comfort and affection, after she had bled to save him from the traps of his past, that he would fail to understand her need to protect the only family she had.

That his hate for magic would overcome his love for her.

He wanted to shake her. To pull her into his arms and press kisses to her lips until she understood, until she was aware to her bones that he would never let her walk alone into peril, that he would always be with her. Only death would ever come between them. And maybe not that, if Sebastian was right.

Orsino had spoken while Fenris was casting his thoughts. And now all eyes were on Hawke and Anders again. He could feel rage beating off of the priest in waves as they watched Hawke stand behind the mage seated now on a crate. Aedan took a breath, then leaned down to whisper something. Goodbye, perhaps. Then she drew out her dagger, placed her hand on his head, pressed him to her, tilted it back and sliced across his pale throat. She held him to her breast a minute and Fenris was viscerally reminded of all the times he'd seen Anders touch her, heal her, save her for him again. Then she released the body, let it slump over and watched as he bled out at her feet, his blood glistening on her hands as it dried. The witch sobbed and Isabela slipped an arm around her waist, comforting. Varric watching with sorrow on his broad face and that writer's distance in his eyes. Aveline nodding her head.

Sebastian staggered and Fenris caught his friend's elbow. And then she was walking back to them, her eyes on the archer, ignoring all else. Him.

She wiped the dagger off on her trousers and spun it, hilt first to Sebastian. He took it, reflexively, but his eyes widened as she shifted closer and with one finger moved the point to her breast and adjusted his grip so it angled down, towards her heart. Fenris felt his mouth drop and he locked his knees, fearful that a sudden move would send her impeccably sharp weapon slicing into her chest with the slightest pressure. "I helped him. I didn' t know, but it's no excuse." Horrified, Sebastian tried to back away but she followed him, her strong little hands gripping his wrist, in a deadly, graceful dance step, their eyes locked and Fenris felt some sympathy. He, too, had been trapped in her pale, level gaze. Measured. Weighed. But Sebastian would die if he took her life.

"Is this what his ingredients were for?" She nodded. "Then I am guilty, as well. Guilty of being naive enough to hope he might wish to change. I cannot hold you responsible, Hawke. I do not." He pulled the dagger away, breaking her grip and twirled it back to her, hilt first. "I will help you, to save your sister and the others. The Maker will understand, we are protecting innocents. They should not bear the brunt of his madness." She gave him a little smile as she placed the dagger back in its scabbard.

She went to walk away, but Fenris caught her wrist, just where the vining tattoo wrapped. She went very still, her long white neck bowed and vulnerable. "I will be coming as well, Hawke. I will not let you make this fight without me." I love you I love you on the tip of his tongue but he couldn't make the words form, they scattered, his voice unequal to the task. She twisted towards him, eyes scanning his face for the truth. And then a soft smile slipped across her lips, her hand turned in his, fingers brushing.

"We need to get going. No telling how long it's going to take to get through that mess." She tipped her head towards the escalating chaos they could hear in the streets. He meant it. It beat in her heart, like a second pulse. He wouldn't leave her today. And she wanted to hide in his arms, but there was no time and that wasn't what they did, anyway.

"Then let us go." I love you I love you. _Venhedis_, they are only words, you coward.

Her companions followed her into the chaos, as always.

They followed her and he watched as the battle overtook her. As she slipped into the rhythm of her fight. Slipping through shadows, using the smoke of the burning buildings to hide herself as demons and bloodmages and Templars fell to her blades. Watched as her certainty slipped with every mage who succumbed to fear, to the lure of power. He hated them anew, for failing to live up to her faith in them. He struck down a dozen Templars, more, to prove to her that nothing mattered more to him than her. Love notes, every one.

She was shaking by the time they got to the docks, laughing madly as they fought the pride demons. Pride. Oh, Maker, she was guilty of so much pride. She loved her daggers. She loved her skill. She loved the sweet cool silence that some part of her hunted in. She was good at this. And here they were at the end.

But between them, they beat the forsaken things. Bloodied, hurt, without Anders to heal them up. But they won. Isabela took just a minute to check on her ship, to send it away from the city to wait for them up the coast. None of them had any illusions that Kirkwall would welcome them back, if they survived.

Aedan sat in the small ferry and tried to pull the shaking inside. She could feel Fenris' worried gaze on her and then his hand, warm and strong, tracing on her shoulder, keeping her tethered.

And then they were at the Gallows. And he had one last chance to touch her face, to speak to her. To say something that might beat back the horror and the faint manic edge. But all he could do was beg her not to die. Because he saw it haunting her, saw it driving her. And then, just before she pulled away he managed to tell her, "I cannot bear the thought of living without you."

And that, that brought her back to him. That brought a wary hope that cut through the gathered shadows in his Hawke's eyes . But still, still she hesitated. And it was the old hurt now, a permanent scar, that he'd left her once that made her tell him she wouldn't promise anything unless he would.

"Nothing will keep me from you." And he grabbed her up, pressed her to his heart, found her mouth and tasted blood on her lips, as familiar and heady in its coppery tang as the cider she favored. He felt her arms come around him and could only think, _please_.

And it occurred to Aedan that in his way, Fenris had been trying to tell her this now for weeks. That he would _never_ leave her, not willingly, not just in this fight, not just today. It left her oddly breathless as if her lungs ( below the ribs a slender blade and only moments between breath and death) had taken some new shape.

It was such a fragile thing to hope for, with blood and death on their heels.

Blood and death. Demons and betrayal. Madness.

Utter madness.

He saw it, when the frayed, strained ribbon of her faith snapped. When Orsino, lost to despair, gave himself over to darker magic than even Fenris had ever seen. Obscene, vile magic that transformed the mage into a horror from nightmare and some bright sureity in Hawke blinked out. White as bleached bone, silent as her shadows, she ripped the thing to shreds and stalked on without a word, without a glance. Leaving the rest of them to trail her. Or not.

Varric and Aveline shared a glance and Fenris paused, waiting to see what they might say. "Broody, catch up with her. Now."

"Fenris. She was like this when the conspiracy kidnapped you, but..."

This is worse, he thinks. This is similar to the bleakness that streamed through her on the way back from the Vimmark Mountains. When she reeled from the discovery that her father dabbled in blood magic, when Anders had turned on them, corrupted by his Warden taint and the demon. When she hadn't spoken to him for days for fear he would only tell her that he'd told her so.

And now, now she was wading through the worst dregs of magic. And none of her mage friends was left unblemished, none but Bethany.

He was afraid for her.

He was at her shoulder through the whole of the battle, when it shifted and suddenly the Templars were fighting with them against the madness that Meredith unleashed. Beside her when she was circling the Knight-Commander like a stalking shark, waiting to dart in and bloody and wear down her prey. At her side when it ended and tugging at her when Cullen dropped his sword, glanced at Bethany and jerked his head towards the undefended gate.

Guiding her, still silent, past their carnage and down to the docks through the secret passages that lead to the far city gate.

Aveline left them there. Kissed Hawke on her cheek and strode back into the burning city to search out Donnic in hopes of salvaging their lives together. Hawke broke her silence to wish the stolid, loyal woman well and watched the Guard Captain disappear beyond a stack of burning crates with empty eyes.

Sebastian tried to leave, tried to head back to the Chantry, to search the rubble for survivors. There was a bitter note in his voice when he asked her, "Where, then, am I to go, Hawke? All I had left was in that building."

"Not all." She tapped his foolish white armor, over his heart. "You have this." She brushed the family crest on his bow. "And you have that. More than some. Come with us." But she rather thought he only followed out of habit.

She gathered herself at the city gate, stepped back into her scout position. It was a quiet trip up the Coast through gathering dusk, though, as if all the horror Kirkwall had built up over dark centuries was ripped away by Anders' appalling act. She felt Fenris' brooding concern on her back but she couldn't let it slow her. She had enough to do, holding herself together, keeping them all moving. If she stopped, if she thought...no. Goodbye to all that. Time to see if King Alistair had been honest in his offer.

Bethany had her eyes on the distance, her thoughts turned inwards. Aedan watched her sister sigh and touch her stomach absently and felt her heart clench. Well, there was a blighted tragedy.

Varric wanted to see the final act. Sebastian kept looking over his shoulder and she hadn't heard him utter a prayer since Meredith betrayed her oaths and turned on her own.

Isabela guided them to a small rowboat and one of her crew rowed them out to the waiting ship. Merrill hesitated, then. Looking back towards Sundermount and the last signs of her clan. They'd disappeared after Marethari's misguided attempt to protect her former first had nearly leveled them all. But she might yet follow. "Hawke, I..."

"If I were your clan elder, I'd have headed for Ferelden. Don't they have hunting grounds, there?" She wanted to hold them together, yet, as much as she could. Fenris bristled beside her. Bringing Sebastian and Varric on their escape was one thing. Merrill, she knew, was another. But Aedan trusted the promises he made tonight, as she had always trusted him. He had her back. If he hadn't turned from her for tonight, he wouldn't . Not over Merrill.

"C'mon, Kitten. I promised to teach you how to sail." Isabela hoisted the elf's gear over the rail onto the deck and Merrill smiled faintly before she clambered up the rope ladder, following the Captain as she set orders for her crew, trying to catch the tide.

Sebastian, too, lingered at the rail. It was Fenris who reminded him, "Did you not wish to traverse the sea, once, Sebastian?"

"It was an old dream, Fenris. I had given it up."

"Now you must dust it off, then. Come, do not leave me to cope with these mad rogues and mages alone." Sebastian was almost laughing when the sails filled and the anchor lifted.

Varric watched Kirkwall disappear, the still-burning fires setting the low-hanging clouds aflame. He stroked Bianca and it was hard to tell if he was taking comfort or giving it. Aedan stopped to pat his shoulder. "I never thanked you, did I, Varric?"

"Thank me for what, Hawke?" He glanced up at her, at her dirty, sweet, tired face and frowned at the sheen she blinked away.

"For setting up that kid to pick my pocket, so you could get yourself an in with me."

He laughed. "Shit, I thought I'd killed him, the way you pulled your knife."

"Best friend I'll ever have. Pardon me, Bianca." Aedan dropped a kiss on his head before she turned away from his city, sinking beyond the horizon like a broken, bleeding second sun.

They parted to find wash water and regrouped to share a bit of a meal. They wete silent with their thoughts, even Merrill.

Aedan slipped away under pretence of putting away her daggers and went to sit in the ship's prow and heard his familiar light tread, heard him curse as he stepped around a fishing net, a sudden wave lurching the boat sideways and sending a blown glass float his way.

"Are you well?"

"I'm fine, Fenris." She turned to give him one of her crooked smiles. "Why wouldn't I be?"

One of his long fingers, yet cased in sharp armor, traced her curving lower lip. "This does not match this." Tip of the finger traveled over the high cheekbone beneath her eye.

"Well, I'm tired, of course. But I'm glad to be going."

He breathed in and looked at his feet. She was hiding something. He thought he knew. "I am sorry. About the mages. And about...him."

She laughed then, bright and sharp as one of her knives. "No, you aren't. Vipers, the lot of them. Except for Bethany." And he did not miss the hard flash of bitterness in her eyes. "I always knew I'd end up killing him, Fenris. I wish I had done it...before. At least for Sebastian's sake."

"He was your friend."

"He was." They stood silently in the humid, heavy air for endless moments. Water sang beneath the ship and the sails nearly phosphorescent in the moonlight slapped as the wind turned fluky for a moment before filling again as Isabela trimmed the ship's wheel.

Hawke's hair was dark and her skin gleamed like scattered pearls. There were still traces of blood around her nails. He had watched her for years, trying to understand. Her face more well known to him now than his own.

Yet he did not know what she would say.

"I love you."

He saw flat panic in her eyes, but she was nothing if not courageous. "I love you, too."

"Why are you afraid? You befriend mages and murderers and walk in the Fade unmolested and laugh when you launch yourself into lines of men bent on spilling your blood."

"You were right beside me in all of that."

"And do you think I will not be beside you in this?"

She looked out over the water, at the moon's reflection trapped beneath the sea. "I..." She shook her head. Everyone who ever said that to me is gone. But it was a maudlin thing to think and he had promised. "You and I...we aren't those people. With their happy ever afters and the dying old and fulfilled in their beds."

Fenris swallowed and set his hands to her shoulders. "I think with practice, we could become those people in years to come. You who have set me lessons and lines, could you not take up such a course of study?"

"It might take years to master such a skill." Her eyes were sly now, her chin tilted in a challenge.

"I cannot think of a better way to spend my time, _alatus." _He slid his hands up to her jaw and cupped her face, brushing her lips with his own. "Nor a better thing to master." Again he kissed her and now her hands curled into his hair and she took the kiss deeper.

"I love you." She whispered it like a prayer against his cheek and it glowed in his heart like a warm coal.

Pressing a kiss to her tattooed wrist, he murmured, "Tell me of Ferelden."

"You're likely to need boots." He laughed, low and rumbling in her ear and Aedan felt like she might fly.


End file.
